


a circuit of consciousness

by pendules



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-24
Updated: 2014-04-24
Packaged: 2018-01-20 15:05:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1514840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pendules/pseuds/pendules
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>He isn't no one, but he isn't someone either. There are remnants of people's lives floating at the bottom of his mind and he's trying to grab hold of them, but they keep escaping and the pieces he does find don't ever add up to one whole person.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	a circuit of consciousness

He follows Steve into the Potomac because that's what he does. That's what he's supposed to do. He follows him. He follows him into back-alley brawls and into battle and onto a train that he won't come back from (although he maybe doesn't know all of this yet). He follows him like he's always been following him.

He's just pure instinct now, and that's what he's been, how he's been trained, programmed, not to ask questions, not to know who the mark is or _why_ , but just how to get the job done. But he's not The Winter Soldier anymore, although he knows what it was like to be him. Maybe this is what happens when he hasn't been scrubbed in a long time; he's just a blank slate again. Just empty consciousness. No mission, no memories, just nature: self-preservation, muscle memory, sensory memory, natural responses to stimuli. 

He isn't no one. He has a name. He has more than one. Is _that_ what makes you someone? He isn't no one, but he isn't someone either. There are remnants of people's lives floating at the bottom of his mind and he's trying to grab hold of them, but they keep escaping and the pieces he does find don't ever add up to one whole person.

He knows what he's supposed to do, how he's supposed to behave. He knows where to go.

It's everything else that's unclear.

*

He stands in front of a museum display with his face on it, and he doesn't know who Bucky Barnes is but he knows what it was like to be him. 

It was good, being Bucky Barnes. For a time. Pretending to not be scared. Taking care of Steve, because maybe making Steve feel safe made _him_ feel safe too.

He doesn't know who Bucky Barnes is but he can probably walk the streets of Brooklyn with his eyes closed. Maybe retrace his steps. Maybe find someone who can tell him.

*

He's retracing someone else's steps now though. He's thinking, _This should be harder._ He's thinking, _There should be more security._

When he gets inside, he's thinking, _Steve_. He's thinking, _Home_. He's thinking, _We'll be okay_.

The only instinct he has when he's standing in Steve's bedroom, looking at Steve's perfectly made bed is to drop his backpack on the floor and crawl in. He hasn't slept in a while, days maybe, because his body hasn't told him to. He's slept too much and not enough, can't remember sleeping, can't remember waking up. The sheets smell like comfort though, like familiarity, like home, _like Steve_ his brain supplies, right before he drifts off.

*

That's where Steve finds him hours later.

*

He doesn't wake him, just sits in a chair next to the bed, like he's afraid he's going to disappear if he leaves him even for a second. Steve's nodded off when he wakes up, in a light sleep (judging by his breathing rate), so he's very quiet. And he just _looks_ for a long time. Looks like he did at the museum, like he'd stared at his own face in the mirror afterwards. It's just - a face, like a name, like - _But I knew him._ Faces aren't supposed to mean anything to him, like names aren't, just items on a list to be checked off. But this - _him_ , he's something to be protected. And that's - that's new.

It's like he can tell when something's familiar but can't make the connections, like lone synapses firing into nothingness, like an incomplete circuit. Something's broken somewhere and he can't find it. Can't fix it. He remembers Steve, his face, his name, remembers where he lives, knows he's something important, but he doesn't know who Steve _is_. Not yet.

And then he's waking up, wiping a hand over his eyes. And Steve almost starts when he realises that he's still here, or awake, or looking at him so intently. Maybe all three.

Steve doesn't say anything so he asks the first question.

"Am I safe?" He doesn't know if he means _Is someone coming after me?_ or _Am I still a threat?_ or both. Because this is self-preservation; this is protecting what matters. And somehow, somewhere along the line, that became Steve.

"Yeah, Buck," he says, like he's relieved, like he can finally breathe. "You're safe with me."

*

He asks a lot of questions after that. Steve answers the best he can and when he thinks he's ready, he gives him his file. And then his breath gets held again, like he thinks he's going to disappear or try to kill him and maybe he doesn't know which would be worse. 

It's like looking at the museum wall though. The dam doesn't break in his head. He knows what it was like, to kill, to destroy, to taste metal and blood and crush skulls and steel between his fingers. But it doesn't feel like _he_ did any of that. It feels far away and a long time ago and lost in ice and snow.

Bucky Barnes feels the same sometimes. But he's nearer somehow, now, sitting in Steve's apartment with the radio on, playing a song he'd danced to once, and Steve was there too, in another time, another world. But they're right back there again, and it's so close, that song, and people laughing, and Steve's voice, the way he'd smiled at him, his hand, gentle but so solid, on his shoulder.

He just likes hearing him talk now. Maybe that helps more than the answers he's giving him. A face, a name, a voice, a smile, a touch… The connections are there now, they're stitching themselves back together and he can't break them so easily.

It all starts adding up pretty quickly. It adds up to Steve. And if he has Steve, then Bucky Barnes isn't far behind.

*

Steve answers all his questions, tells him stories, tells him everything he can remember. Of Bucky, of Steve and Bucky. The file fills in the rest. But - but - when it's done, when he doesn't have anymore to say, comes the dangerous part.

"What do you remember?"

He hasn't said a lot that wasn't a question since he woke up. He takes his time, sorts it out, sorts out his words.

"I remember doing things, just not why. The actions are clear, everything else is blurry."

"You remember doing bad things?" he says softly.

He nods.

"Do you think you'd want to do that again?" 

_Want_. It's a strange word. He doesn't know it. He doesn't know what he wants, doesn't know if he wants to be here, just that he's _supposed_ to be here. Someone else brought him here. He isn't quite sure who anymore.

"I don't know if I have a choice or if I'm still being controlled by all those other people who aren't me anymore. That's the scary part." And he knows how to deal with this. Like Bucky dealt with fear, like The Winter Soldier never had to.

But that's the name for this feeling. He's _scared_ and that's why he came here and that's why Steve's looking at him like that, sad and worried but hopeful too. Because he's _here_ , and it's a start, and he's here and that means it's going to be okay.

*

A week goes by and he sleeps in Steve's bed and Steve takes the couch or, more often than not, doesn't sleep at all. He can hear him sometimes, pacing the apartment when he thinks he's asleep, like he's trying to make a decision.

They're having breakfast, the radio playing softly in the background, when he starts asking questions again.

"Do you want a haircut?" That word again.

"I don't know."

"I think - I think we should take you to see someone."

And he tenses up because it's not safe anymore, that's not safe -

"A doctor," Steve says, quickly. "Neurologist. Used to work for SHIELD."

"Did you tell anyone else?"

"No. I won't, not until you're ready."

"Okay." He doesn't know which part he's agreeing to.

*

Steve cuts his hair over the sink in the bathroom. He closes his eyes as the locks fall, and it feels safe, it feels like _trust_.

Looking at his face in the mirror afterwards, he almost feels like someone again.

*

The brain scan's inconclusive. There's damage, of course, but no one's sure if it's permanent or not. Memory loss is a strange thing; it varies from case to case, and his case is definitely not typical.

He feels angry, because it's not an answer. No one can sort through his brain matter and find the person he's supposed to be. It's just as useless as he feels.

"Hey, it's okay, Buck, let's go home."

*

Steve's been going out more, leaving him on his own. Maybe it's his way of telling him he thinks he's safe, or he thinks he won't leave again, thinks he'll _choose_ to stay.

"Hey, you wanna come meet some friends with me?" he says casually one day, and there's no flight-or-fight response, no panic, so he just nods.

*

Steve tells him about them on the walk there, and it's sunny, and kids are riding bikes and people are walking their dogs, and he can remember this - remember being with Steve like this, but it doesn't just feel like a memory, it feels like something _new_.

He stares up at the menu for a long time and it's too much and it's overwhelming. And then Steve guides him over to an empty table, tells him he'll pick something out for him.

Sam and Natasha come in just as they get their drinks.

Sam looks friendly but appropriately cautious and Natasha doesn't look like she's ready to take him out by depriving him of oxygen if need be. But maybe she's _always_ ready. He remembers her, remembers what the air smelled like, remembers pulling the trigger.

"So, did you tell him?" Steve asks her as soon as they sit down.

She tries to look offended.

"I can keep a secret. I've been doing it for a long time."

"So, you didn't come with back-up?"

"We're in a _Starbucks_."

"Exactly. Who knows what evils are lurking in here?"

Sam laughs, Natasha rolls her eyes. 

"I didn't think there was anything to tell. At least not yet," she says, and she looks at him then properly. Assessing a threat, making calculations, trying to predict its movements. He knows that look.

Sam's looking at him in a completely different way though.

"I think he's okay," he decides. "Even though he threw me off a helicarrier that one time."

Steve finally cracks a smile and looking at him, he does too.

*

"Are you going to take me in?"

"What?"

"To SHIELD."

"SHIELD doesn't exist anymore, pal." He can't tell if Steve is unhappy about that.

"So…"

"So what?"

"What are you going to _do_ with me?"

"I don't know what there is to do, Bucky. I just thought about _finding_ you, not what comes after, I guess." He sounds sorry now, eyes meeting his.

"I killed people, lots of people. You can't just -"

"Buck -" he says, and he's closer now, and his hand is on his shoulder, firmer than he remembers.

"No, no, it was _me_. I did it. Maybe they made me do it, maybe I didn't know what I was doing, but I still did it. It was still me."

_Me, me, it was me. This is me. Still._

Steve wraps his arms around him then, cradles his head against his chest, and this is him too. Murderer and friend and scared and angry but safe, _safe_ , safe now, and _home_.

*

They both sleep that night, tangled together in Steve's bed, and they're not waiting for anything. Not anymore.

*

A couple weeks after, they take a walk again. And Steve holds his hand, gently, casually, and oh - that's new too, that's _different_. And after so long of trying to remember the past, of listening to all these stories, maybe he's starting to see something else. See what the future could be like.

And he actually decides what to order with less than five minutes' deliberation and that's a win, if they've had one. Steve is smiling that softer, expectant smile, like he's proud and content and wistful all at once.

He's slowly regaining things, memories, things that he can call his own. But he has Steve in the meantime. And Steve is the most certain of all.

It's instinct when he reaches over to place one hand over Steve's on the table.

It's also instinct when he kisses him after in the apartment, one hand pulling him in by the hip, the other resting lightly against his jaw.

It's not instinct when he decides there's a name for this feeling and it's _love_.

It's also not when he realises that this is where he's supposed to be for as long as he possibly can.


End file.
